A FAMILY doctor who was part of Oxford’s first all-women medical practice has died aged 99.

Dr Eleanor Herrin joined the famous Trinity College consulting rooms at 53 Broad Street in 1947, joining founders Victoria Smallpiece and Mary Fraser.

On the day the National Health Service (NHS) was founded in 1948 the practice joined and, it is believed, could have been the first run by women in the country.

It was the precursor to the original Jericho Health Centre in Walton Street, which then Senator Edward Kennedy, youngest brother of President John F Kennedy, was taken on a tour by Dr Herrin herself.

Dr Herrin continued to work for the NHS for the rest of her career, working out of her home at 255 Woodstock Road.

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Her son-in-law, Anthony Barnett, said: “Eleanor Herrin was a formidable and much-appreciated family doctor with a tremendous reputation.

“She was an advocate of women’s equality and in the 1960s became known as willing to prescribe contraceptives as the sexual revolution got under way.”

Eleanor Joy Burchardt was born on January 26, 1915, in Caversfield, near Bicester, to parents Ernest and Viola.

She had three brothers and three sisters, grew up in Banbury Road, Oxford, and attended Wychwood School for girls, as well as Sherborne School for Girls, in Dorset.

Later she went up to Oxford, studying at St Anne’s, and qualified as a doctor at the Royal Free Hospital in London.

There, Dr Herrin trained with physiologist and late Somerville principal Dame Janet Vaughan.

Dr Herrin went on to become part of Oxford’s first all-women medical practice.

Founded by Miss Smallpiece and Miss Fraser, the consulting rooms used at 53 Broad Street are now occupied by Blackwell’s bookshop.

When the NHS was founded in 1948, she became one of its GPs —an occupation she held for the rest of her life.

Dr Herrin met her future husband, Philip Herrin, in London in 1938 and they were married at St Andrew’s Church in Linton Road, Oxford, in 1939.

The couple lived in Moreton Road until 1943, when Mr Herrin was shot down over Germany and killed during the war while serving as a navigator aboard a Lancaster bomber.

They had one daughter in 1942, Judith, who is now a distinguished archaeologist and academic. Dr Herrin’s hobbies included playing the viola and she was in a number of amateur quartets in Oxford. She was also a keen gardener.

Eleanor Herrin died peacefully at her home in Woodstock Road on October 22.

She is survived by her daughter Judith, as well as two granddaughters and one great-granddaughter.

A funeral will be held on November 7 at Oxford Crematorium. All are welcome.

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